While Harvard’s research program could help us to better understand solar geoengineering, they should be careful not to oversell their program at the cost of broader climate action. Likewise, we should be careful not to think their program provides an excuse to avoid rapidly reducing our dependence on fossil fuels and carbon emissions.

Sometimes the ethical statesperson or policymaker must be prepared to refuse requests for action on the grounds that aid cannot credibly be rendered and/or any intervention could conceivably make the situation worse.